Jacqueline Betty Foil

Jackie Foil was born into the depression, an only child of Brooklyn parents. She was blessed with a wonderful father and grandmother, and - because her grandmother remarried a train engineer - she traveled extensively as a child, including trips to California and Florida.

The first in her family to graduate from college (Brooklyn College), she was a public school teacher until she retired in 1991. She was active in the organizing of public school teachers, and helped the United Federation of Teachers in recruiting and organizing efforts in Kansas in the 1960’s, where she met and worked frequently with Al Shanker, the organizing force behind the UFT.

When Gan Yerushalayim, the preschool at Temple Emanu-el, suddenly lost its director in 1992, Jackie came to Hawaii, where her granddaughter, Amy, was set to become a student at the Gan. While she lasted only one year in that position, she returned in the spring of 1994 to help when her successor flamed out in failure.

After the Gan, she was ecstatic to get a position when Borders opened a second store on Oahu at Ward Warehouse in their children’s book department. The opportunity to read to children, and to take books home, made this her ‘dream job.’

She reveled in her Shitzu, Nahe Nahe, and in her five grandchildren: three by oldest son, Ken, and his wife, Gail: Joshua, Rocky & Amy, and two by her younger son, Gary: Devin and Dylan.

She was very active in Jewish life in Honolulu, both as a member of Temple Emanu-el’s Sisterhood and the Hawaii Jewish Film Festival. She was honored as a Woman of Valor by Sisterhood and served on the Board of the newer version of Jewish Community Services.

Jackie was married twice, first to Dolphe Marcus (with whom she had her two sons) and second to Murray Lander. Both ended in divorce. She outlived both husbands, and is survived by both of her sons and all of her grandchildren (and Josh’s son, her great-grandson, Ezra).

Fond memories and expressions of sympathy may be shared at www.BorthwickOahu.com for the Foil family.